A Queen and Her Seven Servants {BTS}

Chapter Thirty Five ~

I looked up at my mother through teary eyes. "I'm sorry," I sobbed. "I can't do it, Mother. I can't do it."

Mother sighed before giving me a kind smile. "Eve, it takes guts to be a queen. There aren't instructions for every circumstance that queens from the beginning of time to the end will have to deal with."

I looked around the room we were in, but everything seemed hazy and distorted. "Mother, I can't be a good queen for Aaliyah. Not when I make stupid decisions that I can't even think through. I'm not even there to rule it."

Mother's face didn't show any emotion as she stood before me. "All queens go through trials. Only good queens can make it out of them."

I fell to the ground at her feet, a crying mess. "But, Mother, I can't do this. I can't go on. Not like this. I don't understand how I got here or why I'm here. I don't understand why they're treating me like I'm a criminal. I just want to go back home." I sniffled before my body curled up a little ball. "I need you and Father to come back."

"We're always here, Eve," she replied. "You don't need us, though. You only want us. Aaliyah and her people may act like they don't want you, but they need you. And you need to remember that. Aaliyah needs you, and the more time you spend crying over things you can't control, the more time you waste not helping your people."

"But I can't go back," I answered. My tears began to subside as I began to feel sleepy.

"The light at the end of the tunnel seems dim, Eve, but it's still there nonetheless." Mother's footsteps began to fade away and her voice seemed distant. "Find a way to get back. When you find it, fight until you get there. Kings are often regarded as being the ones who go into battle but show Desdemona that queens can fight just the same."

***

I hissed in pain as I tried to sit up from my position on the dirt floor. My back burned and I yelped before going back to laying on the cold stone. I could feel the wounds on my back throb as my heartbeat and I could only imagine what it must look like.

As I laid on the floor, I tried to focus on my dream. My mother's words seemed like a distant memory as they were faint and almost undecipherable. All I could hear clearly was "fight." I tried to focus on the one word and remind myself that that was my new task. I was to fight until I got out of here and back home. But my mind began to falter, and I thought back to the day before.

I couldn't recall much. Walking into the throne room, having Blaine's dad mock me before a soldier unrolled his whip. From there, things became blurry and hazy. I couldn't recall the feeling of the glass shards tied to the end of the whip cutting into my back and pulling at my skin. They had unbuttoned the back of my dress to better access my bareback. I don't remember the jokes the King made as he watched me crumble to the floor in pain. All I remember was focusing on Blaine.

I tried to telepathically tell him to stop this torture. I tried to tell him to stop his dad from mocking me and telling the guards to keep hurting me. But he only sat there, choking on his sobs. He was forced to be there and watch his childhood friend suffer. I heard his dad tell him, "This is what happens when other kingdoms try to wrong us and think they can get away with it." I couldn't hear Blaine's rebuttal, but as the throne room's door closed behind me, I heard his dad yell at him, using his real full name.

I wanted Jackson back. The real him. Not the him that his parents – well, his dad – tried to mold. Jackson was always Jackson to me until he turned twelve. From then on, his dad said he would be known as Blaine. Jackson was too common of a name for Desdemona's young prince to be called. He needed to be known as something different, something that would roll off the tongue well and something that you wouldn't forget.

"Blaine's a little plain," I joked, snickering behind my hand when Jackson told me his new name.

"Well, not everyone gets to have a pretty name like you, Eve," he answered.

First, his name was changed. It became an unwritten law in Desdemona to refer to the prince as Blaine, not Jackson. The punishment for using his birth name was death by hanging in the public square, in front of everyone. The King wanted something that told the people that it was a sin to use the prince's real name. It instilled fear in the people, and Jackson became known as Blaine, the Handsome Prince of Desdemona. I was even scared to use his real name, thus why I made it a habit to use his alias. After that, everyone seemed to forget that the Prince of Desdemona had another name.

Then, he was forced into an arranged marriage with a girl he barely knew. It was the daughter of his mom's best friend. This is had been secretly in the works for a while, but the King never made his son aware until later. Sure, arranged marriages were common in some countries, but not in Desdemona, and the Queen certainly was opposed to the idea. It was the King's idea, though, so neither her, her son nor anyone else that knew of the arrangement could do anything about it. Jackson had told me many times that he thought the girl was nice from the few times he had talked to her, but he'd much rather be with someone else.

"He means you, ya know?" Baekhyun snickered.

Jackson's face flushed. "I never said that!"

I gave him a shocked look. "So you wouldn't want to marry me, Princess Evangeline of Aaliyah, the most beautiful of all the princesses?"

Baekhyun fell back onto the roof laughing while Jackson just stammered, his face red with blush. "I never said that either! Will you two stop putting words in my mouth?!"

There were other things the King did to ensure Jackson a rich future as Desdemona's next king. He made him attend things only Kings and Queens should attend. That's why he became accustomed to acting like a King. That's why I always had to bring him back down to earth. He was still just a prince.

The King of Desdemona wanted the prince to be another him when he took the throne. The people didn't want another King Phillip. They didn't want a King Phillip that made the people tremble in fear, afraid that even breathing the wrong way would cause him to kill them. Only royals knew what was really going on there, so when the King would boast about having much more people moving and becoming citizens of his country, I, along with my fellow Kings, Queens, and Princesses and Princes alike, would just smile and tell him congratulations while hoping that they'd leave as soon as possible.

To the people, Desdemona was a place full of life, party, and splendor. You always heard of other Kings and Queens complimenting the kingdom after attending one of King Phillip's famous parties. But the royals knew that all the partying and riches were a façade. Only they knew they couldn't expose the ugly truth that lied underneath. A trap awaited those who did King Phillip wrong.

I seemed to have found that trap.

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and i oop-